A Thousand Splendid Suns

to guide the spoke, if indeed she could ever love Rasheed's child as she
had Tariq's.
In the end, Laila couldn't do it.
It wasn't the fear of bleeding to death that made her drop the spoke, or
even the idea that the act was damnable- which she suspected it was.
Laila dropped the spoke because she could not accept what the
Mujahideen readily had: that sometimes in war innocent life had to be
taken. Her war was against Rasheed. The baby was blameless. And there
had been enough killing already. Laila had seen enough killing of
innocents caught in the cross fire of enemies.
39.
Madam September 1997
“This hospital no longer treats women," the guard barked. He was
standing at the top of the stairs, looking down icily on the crowd
gathered in front of Malalai Hospital.
A loud groan rose from the crowd.
"But this is a women's hospital!" a woman shouted behind Mariam. Cries
of approval followed this.
Mariam shifted Aziza from one arm to the other. With her free arm, she
supported Laila, who was moaning, and had her own arm flung around
Rasheed's neck.
"Not anymore," the Talib said.
"My wife is having a baby!" a heavyset man yelled. "Would you have
her give birth here on the street, brother?"
Mariam had heard the announcement, in January of that year, that men
and women would be seen in different hospitals, that all female staff
would be discharged from Kabul's hospitals and sent to work in one